So, how is everyone feeling about this defense going into the playoffs?

[KOKBILLS]

Honestly I'm not feeling good at all and I'm concerned about this Defense against anyone... Denver and Miami included. I think Cincy would put up a 40 burger in their sleep against this bunch...

 

I think living by the turnover and tightening up in the red zone is dangerous business. But it's great when it works...

 

The good news is our Offense can outscore anybody, any given day...and I'm usually wrong... 

Edited January 1 by KOKBILLS

[NickelCity]

[LABILLBACKER]

44% 3rd down rate....31st in the NFL

 

.....If we don't generate takeaways,  we're in deep trouble. Josh must start games hot.

[Thurman#1]

8 hours ago, FireChans said:

 

we have had borderline elite regular seasons defenses with multiple All Pros fall apart in the postseason. 
 

 

 

We really haven't.

 

In fact we've had very good regular season defenses - borderline elite? Well, maybe - produce very good results in the postseason until they ran up against the Kansas City Chiefs. Who have won a number of SB titles mostly because nobody could stop their offense when it was firing on all cylinders.

 

Though the Chiefs defense was also pretty good. Except when they ran up against the Bills who kinda ripped them apart as well. If we'd won the coin flip in the 13 seconds game, we would have won the game. They couldn't stop us.

 

The two are somewhat mirror images, with the Chiefs being a bit better, damn it.

 

There is the one other game, the Bengals game, but our whole team played listless, both offense and defense. They looked to me like they were simply emotionally emptied by the Hamlin thing, the home game being moved, the mass shooter, Knox's brother dying, the dozens killed in the blizzards, and so on. If you want to include that game, fair enough, go ahead, but include the offense also. 

 

 

 

As for how confident I am ... reasonably. Not without reservations, but reasonably confident that if the offense plays well the defense if they're healthy can do enough to keep us in a game with anyone.

[Georgia Bill]

Happy New Year Bills Fans!   Let our defense be stout, our offense shine, and our team be victorious!

[FireChans]

7 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

We really haven't.

 

In fact we've had very good regular season defenses - borderline elite? Well, maybe - produce very good results in the postseason until they ran up against the Kansas City Chiefs. Who have won a number of SB titles mostly because nobody could stop their offense when it was firing on all cylinders.

 

Though the Chiefs defense was also pretty good. Except when they ran up against the Bills who kinda ripped them apart as well. If we'd won the coin flip in the 13 seconds game, we would have won the game. They couldn't stop us.

 

The two are somewhat mirror images, with the Chiefs being a bit better, damn it.

 

There is the one other game, the Bengals game, but our whole team played listless, both offense and defense. They looked to me like they were simply emotionally emptied by the Hamlin thing, the home game being moved, the mass shooter, Knox's brother dying, the dozens killed in the blizzards, and so on. If you want to include that game, fair enough, go ahead, but include the offense also. 

 

 

 

As for how confident I am ... reasonably. Not without reservations, but reasonably confident that if the offense plays well the defense if they're healthy can do enough to keep us in a game with anyone.

I have gone through it before, and basically every game against the Chiefs/Bengals in the postseason has been one of their best offensive games of the year, if not THE best.

[Mikie2times]

5 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

We really haven't.

 

In fact we've had very good regular season defenses - borderline elite? Well, maybe - produce very good results in the postseason until they ran up against the Kansas City Chiefs. Who have won a number of SB titles mostly because nobody could stop their offense when it was firing on all cylinders.

 

Though the Chiefs defense was also pretty good. Except when they ran up against the Bills who kinda ripped them apart as well. If we'd won the coin flip in the 13 seconds game, we would have won the game. They couldn't stop us.

 

The two are somewhat mirror images, with the Chiefs being a bit better, damn it.

 

There is the one other game, the Bengals game, but our whole team played listless, both offense and defense. They looked to me like they were simply emotionally emptied by the Hamlin thing, the home game being moved, the mass shooter, Knox's brother dying, the dozens killed in the blizzards, and so on. If you want to include that game, fair enough, go ahead, but include the offense also. 

 

 

 

As for how confident I am ... reasonably. Not without reservations, but reasonably confident that if the offense plays well the defense if they're healthy can do enough to keep us in a game with anyone.

Who have we put up good defensive performances against? Baltimore in the wind tunnel? Who else?

 

That year in 2021 when the Colts dropped 400+ yards and almost beat us and KC hung 40+ points the defense was the number 1 scoring unit in football. 

2 minutes ago, FireChans said:

I have gone through it before, and basically every game against the Chiefs/Bengals in the postseason has been one of their best offensive games of the year, if not THE best.

Against the Colts as well. All

Produced top 3 epa’s for the entire season vs us in the playoff. 

[Thurman#1]

38 minutes ago, FireChans said:

I have gone through it before, and basically every game against the Chiefs/Bengals in the postseason has been one of their best offensive games of the year, if not THE best.

 

 

Yeah, OK, though not sure how that disagrees with anything I said.

 

Again, when the Chiefs are playing really well, they can beat pretty much any defense., or at least in past years Same with our offense.

 

[DapperCam]

Best case scenario is the defense holds teams to FGs and produces some turnovers. I don't think we'll be able to stop teams much between the 20s. The offense will need to produce.

[bmur66]

My feeling is that the Bills defense needs to prove it is capable of winning games in the playoffs. 

[Thurman#1]

57 minutes ago, Mikie2times said:

Who have we put up good defensive performances against? Baltimore in the wind tunnel? Who else?

 

That year in 2021 when the Colts dropped 400+ yards and almost beat us and KC hung 40+ points the defense was the number 1 scoring unit in football. 

Against the Colts as well. All

Produced top 3 epa’s for the entire season vs us in the playoff. 

 

 

Everyone else we've played in the playoffs after the team came together in 2020. That's who.

 

Including the Colts, who we held to 24 points though they were averaging 28.2 PPG for the season. And again, it was the defense who salted that game away. 

 

Up three, the Bills got the ball back with 6:13 to go in the 4th Q, and a chance to ice it. But Indy forced 'em to punt. 

 

The Colts got the ball back with 2:30 left on the clock, a ton of time left to go when you only need a field goal to tie. But the defense absolutely throttled them, finally leading them to have to go for a hail mary on 4th and 11 from the Buffalo 47 with 0:04 left on the clock. 

 

Lost the ball on downs as time ran out.

 

Oh, and defensive EPA is as much on the offense and the STs as the D. It's highly affected by field position when you get the ball. 

 

Not to mention that Expected Points matter a whole hell of a lot less than the actual ones. Which again, amounted to 24 for Indy, significantly below their season average.

 

 

Edited January 1 by Thurman#1

[Dr.Sack]

Good vibes. The defense is rounding into form and we all know McD and Babich can squeeze production out of units led by AJ Klein and CB 3/4s. I expect this is a defense that has kept most of the secrets in the deck and will unload come playoff time. I expect this defense will only do better and hold opposing offenses under 20 points per game.  

[FireChans]

18 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Yeah, OK, though not sure how that disagrees with anything I said.

 

Again, when the Chiefs are playing really well, they can beat pretty much any defense., or at least in past years Same with our offense.

 

The bottom line is that no matter the year, no matter the circumstance, no matter how good the defense is in the regular season, the defense has always played bad vs the Chiefs/Bengals.

 

you can sit there and say it was because this guy was hurt, or that guy was hurt, but it happened.

 

We will be able to play that game this year too, if it happens. But it won’t change the fact it keeps happening. 

[Richard Noggin]

8 hours ago, machine gun kelly said:

Bill, I’m guessing the same with a healthy Milano, Bernard, and Williams we’ll play more base (3 LB’s) which means we’ll be more susceptible to the pass against Baltimore.  Cine may also play more as well in that game so it’s not normally a great idea pulling one of our best in Taron, but we’ll have Taron out there for Denver and KC if we get that far.

 

These base ideas are unique to our Baltimore opponent.  The key with the Ravems is clog up the middle along with a base defense, and you invite Lamar to only throw outside the hashes.  He can do that, but not nearly as well as the other elite QB’s like Burrow, Josh, and Herbert.

 

When I have hopeful thoughts about the Bills D it's because I remember them against the 49ers (in Arizona in 2020) unveiling a 5-2 defensive front with Edmunds in an "over" alignment as an EDGE essentially, and Milano and Klein as the two off-ball LBs. Allowed for an additional DT to replace one of the DEs. It helped to keep a lid on San Fran's formidable running game (even though they passed productively against us). And then the Bills NEVER used this alignment again LOL.

 

We agree we saw some flashes of innovation and aggression against both KC and Det this season. yeah? Like actual dynamic gameplans that the opponents weren't initially prepared for? I think where McDermott is most conservative is with how much he generally wants to hold onto, how little he wants to deviate from his core philosophies, whenever possible. Compare him to Campbell in Detroit, for contrast. Those coordinators, especially Johnson, seem to relish calling all the plays. Like for them, just like for their players, there is only one way to call/play the game: FULL SPEED. I admire that.

[Thurman#1]

19 minutes ago, FireChans said:

The bottom line is that no matter the year, no matter the circumstance, no matter how good the defense is in the regular season, the defense has always played bad vs the Chiefs/Bengals.

 

you can sit there and say it was because this guy was hurt, or that guy was hurt, but it happened.

 

We will be able to play that game this year too, if it happens. But it won’t change the fact it keeps happening. 

 

 

Yeah, it's really sad how the Bills can't seem to stop the Chiefs offense and all those other teams do.

 

For instance, there's the ... um ... all those teams that stopped them consistently when they needed a successful drive to win ... um ... the uh ... the uh.

 

Hmm, it's almost as if they won those SBs for good reason.

 

 

Edited January 1 by Thurman#1

[stuvian]

We are going into these playoffs having beaten the best teams in the league. I'm calling the Rams loss as a mental day off where we didn't show up.

 

The Texans loss came early perhaps before we got in synch as a defense. The Ravens loss came the week after. Remember that the Ravens have lost to the Raiders and Browns this year. They have issues too. 

 

Everything is momentum and health. The era of the 1985 Bears and 2000 Ravens defenses has been edited out by rule changes. The only opponent winning with defense this year is San Diego. 

 

While I don't expect any easy outs in the post season, I expect our defense to do just enough to get us Ws. 

[Mikie2times]

17 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Everyone else we've played in the playoffs after the team came together in 2020. That's who.

 

Including the Colts, who we held to 24 points though they were averaging 28.2 PPG for the season. And again, it was the defense who salted that game away. 

 

Up three, the Bills got the ball back with 6:13 to go in the 4th Q, and a chance to ice it. But Indy forced 'em to punt. 

 

The Colts got the ball back with 2:30 left on the clock, a ton of time left to go when you only need a field goal to tie. But the defense absolutely throttled them, finally leading them to have to go for a hail mary on 4th and 11 from the Buffalo 47 with 0:04 left on the clock. 

 

Lost the ball on downs as time ran out.

 

Oh, and defensive EPA is as much on the offense and the STs as the D. It's highly affected by field position when you get the ball. 

 

Not to mention that Expected Points matter a whole hell of a lot less than the actual ones. Which again, amounted to 24 for Indy, significantly below their season average.

 

 

EPA is impacted by field position. It’s very hard to see the logic in dismissing it as an evaluation tool in the postseason based on that reason. At the end of the day if you want to determine success by not “fully breaking” but doing everything but that, so be it. It was the most first downs they had all year and the most yards they had all year. We have seen plenty of other times where historic numbers like that converted perfectly fine into points vs us. 

5 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Yeah, it's really sad how the Bills can't seem to stop the Chiefs offense and all those other teams do.

 

For instance, there's the ... um ... all those teams that stopped them consistently when they needed a successful drive to win ... um ... the uh ... the uh.

 

Hmm, it's almost as if they won those SBs for good reason.

 

 

So it’s your take that if we get performances like the Bengals or 49ers vs KC on defense we still

don’t win?

[Solomon Grundy]

I'm more worried about the special teams

 

[billsherd]

D will have to change up some tendencies to get through the playoffs. 

[GoBills808]

1 hour ago, Mikie2times said:

EPA is impacted by field position. It’s very hard to see the logic in dismissing it as an evaluation tool in the postseason based on that reason. At the end of the day if you want to determine success by not “fully breaking” but doing everything but that, so be it. It was the most first downs they had all year and the most yards they had all year. We have seen plenty of other times where historic numbers like that converted perfectly fine into points vs us. 

So it’s your take that if we get performances like the Bengals or 49ers vs KC on defense we still

don’t win?

Ravens settled in too

 

17 total points, 4.4 ypp and entire Chiefs second half went punt/punt/punt/punt/punt

 

The Chiefs offense definitely doesn't roll everyone else like they do us